1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to stents positionable within the body of a patient and more particularly relates to a stent for delivering a therapeutic agent therefrom and a method and system for delivery of a therapeutic agent to replenish the stent.
2. Description of Related Art
Physicians often use medical guidewires and catheters in combination. Medical guidewires are devices navigable through narrow passages in the body such as vessels, tubes, ducts, passages and the like, hereinafter collectively referred to as vessels. A physician controls the position and travel of a distal end of the guidewire by manipulating a steering mechanism at a proximal end outside the body. In other applications the physician guides the catheter through a laparoscope or endoscope. Medical catheters generally comprise hollow, flexible tubes that convey fluids, such as contrast, embolic, or pharmacological agents, to or from a vessel within a body.
Typically in transluminal procedures, a physician inserts and directs a medical guidewire through a vessel in a patient's body. The physician monitors the travel of the guidewire by a fluoroscope or other known device. Once positioned proximate the desired area, a steering mechanism is removed from the guidewire and a medical catheter is inserted into the vessel along the guidewire. Other procedures are also well known for directing catheters or similar devices into larger vessels of the body such as the esophagus.
Often these catheters include specialized attachments for providing different treatment modalities. For example, the following references disclose catheters with attachments for administering a therapeutic agent and performing balloon therapy:                U.S. Pat. No. 4,824,436 (1989) Wolinsky        U.S. Pat. No. 4,832,688 (1989) Sagae et al.        U.S. Pat. No. 5,254,089 (1993) Wang        Ser. No. 08/105,737 (1993) Lennox et al.        
U.S. Pat. No. 4,824,436 to Wolinsky discloses a multi-lumen catheter having opposed ring balloons positionable on opposite sides of a plaque formation in a blood vessel. Inflation of the ring balloons define an isolated volume in the vessel about the plaque. Heparin is then injected into the volume between the ring to assist the body in repairing the plaque deposit. This patent also discloses a central balloon which can be employed to rupture the plaque prior to inflation of the ring balloon.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,832,688 to Sagae et al. discloses a multi-lumen catheter having an occlusion balloon positionable distally of a tear in a vessel wall. Inflating the balloon occludes the vessel and isolates at the tear. A therapeutic agent, such as heparin or thrombin, injected from the catheter into the volume reduces the risk of thrombosis or restenosis. The balloon is then deflated and moved adjacent the rupture and reinflated to repair the ruptured wall by coagulation of blood thereat.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,254,089 discloses a balloon catheter having an array of conduits disposed within the outer wall of the balloon. The conduits include apertures in the other wall for delivery of medications through the wall of the balloon into the body of a patient. This type of balloon is often referred to as a channeled balloon.
U.S. application Ser. No. 08/105,737 to Lennox et al., discloses catheters having spaced balloons for treating aneurysms. The inflated balloons define an isolated volume about the aneurysm. A port connects a vacuum source to evacuate the volume and draw the aneurysmal wall toward its ordinary position. Inflating a third balloon with a heated fluid to contact the aneurysmal wall effects the repair.
Therapeutic agent and balloon delivery systems must meet certain criteria. That is, the cross-sectional dimension of the catheter must be minimized to enable transit through the vessel while also having sufficient dimension to enable fluid flow to selectively inflate and deflate the balloon, guidewires to pass therein, and therapeutic agents to flow therethrough for delivery along the catheter. Catheters must also have sufficient internal rigidity to prevent collapse of the lumens while having sufficient flexibility for passage along vessels.
The following references disclose stent delivery systems:                U.S. Pat. No. 4,690,684 (1987) McGreevy et al.        U.S. Pat. No. 4,922,905 (1990) Strecker        U.S. Pat. No. 4,950,227 (1990) Savin et al.        U.S. Pat. No. 5,059,211 (1991) Stack et al.        U.S. Pat. No. 5,108,416 (1992) Ryan et al.        U.S. Pat. No. 5,158,548 (1992) Lau et al.        U.S. Pat. No. 5,234,457 (1993) Anderson        U.S. Pat. No. 5,242,399 (1993) Lau et al.        
Stent delivery systems, as disclosed by the Lau et al. and Ryan et al. patents, often include a catheter supporting a compacted stent for transport in a vessel and an expansible device for expanding the stent radially to implant the stent in the vessel wall. After removal of the catheter, the expanded stent keeps the vessels from closing.
The McGreevy et al. patent discloses a stent formed of biologically compatible material, such a frozen blood plasma or the like. According to McGreevy et al., a stent of this type carried by a catheter may be inserted into opposed ends of a ruptured vessel to support the separated vessel walls while the ends are bonded together. Once deployed, the heat from the bonding operation and the body eventually melt the stent and clear the vessel.
The Strecker, patent describes a stent and delivery system. The stent is knitted from metal or plastic filaments and has a tubular structure. The delivery system includes a balloon catheter and a coaxial sheath. The catheter supports and carries the compacted stent to a site within the body. The sheath covers the stent preventing premature deployment and facilitating transit of the stent through passages in the body. Exposure of the stent by moving the sheath axially with respect to the catheter and expansion of a balloon urges the stent into contact with the walls of the vessel. Deflation of the balloon frees it from the stent and enables withdrawal from the vessel of the delivery system.
In the Savin et al. patent a stent delivery system includes a catheter having an expansible distal portion, a stent carried thereon in a contracted position for expansion thereby and sleeves that overlie the end portions of the stent. The sleeves protect the vessel and the stent during transit without substantially inhibiting deployment of the stent.
The Stack et al. patent discloses a stent delivery system comprising a catheter for delivering a compressed stent on a balloon or mechanical extension to the locus of a stenotic lesion. The balloon or mechanical extension proximate the distal end expands the stent and deflation of the balloon or retraction of the mechanical extension permits withdrawal of the distal end of the catheter through the stent. The stent comprises bioabsorbable porous material that reduces the likelihood of embolization and promotes tissue ingrowth in order to encapsulate the stent.
In accordance with the Anderson patent a stent delivery system includes a dissolvable material that impregnates a self-expanding stent in a compacted form. In one embodiment the removal of a sheath exposes the stent to body heat and liquids so that the material dissolves and the stent expands into a
Stent delivery systems used in such procedures generally include catheters with selectively expansible devices to deliver and expand a contracted “stent” or restraints that can be removed to allow a self-expanding stent to assure an enlarged or expanded configuration. Stents are known and have a variety of forms and applications. For example, stents serve as prostheses and graft carriers in percutaneous angioplasty. Stents used as an endoprothesis and graft carriers to which the present invention relates usually comprise radially expansible tubular structures for implant into the tissue surrounding “vessels” to maintain their patency. As is known, such stents are utilized in body canals, blood vessels, ducts and other body passages, and the term “vessel” is meant to include all such passages.
Like the previously described therapeutic agent and balloon therapy systems, stent delivery systems must conform to several important criteria. First, it is important to minimize the transverse dimension of the delivery system, so the stent must be capable of compaction against a delivery device, such as a catheter. Second, the delivery system must facilitate the deployment of the stent once located in a vessel. Third, the stent delivery system must easily disengage from the stent after the stent is deployed. Fourth, the procedure for removing the delivery system from the body must be straightforward. Fifth, the delivery system must operate reliably.
It has been found that the administration of therapeutic agents with a stent can reduce the risks of thrombosis or stenosis associated with stents. Stents administered along with seed cells, such as endothelial cells derived from adipose tissue, can accelerate the reformation of an afflicted area. Likewise, tears or other vessel damage associated with balloon angioplasty can be reduced by a deployed stent used in combination with a therapeutic agent.
When both therapeutic agent and stent therapies are required, a physician generally (1) steers a guidewire to the treatment locus, (2) guides a catheter over the guidewire, (3) operates the catheter to provide the first stage of treatment, (4) inserts an exchange guidewire to the guidewire, (5) withdraws the catheter, (6) guides a second catheter over the guidewire, and (7) operates the second catheter to provide the second stage of treatment. After this, the physician withdraws the guidewire, if not previously removed, and the catheter from the body of the patient.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,439,446 to James Barry the inventor of the present invention and commonly assigned discloses a stent delivery system that incorporates a drug delivery system in the catheter. This device permits the surgeon to use one catheter to deliver both the stent and the therapeutic agent at a selected site in the patient's body.
Other references disclose the use of stents that release therapeutic agents associated with a deployed stent over time. For example U.S. Pat. No. 5,234,457 to Andersen commonly assigned as this invention discloses stents impregnated with a gelatin that enables the release of the stent. It is suggested that the gelatin could entrain a therapeutic agent that dispenses as the gelatin dissolves.
These references thus provide the ability to deliver stents and therapeutic agents to an afflicted site within a patient's body and even enables the dispersion of the therapeutic agent from the stent over time. However, if additional therapeutic agent is needed at the site another catheter must be inserted to deliver the therapeutic agent or by generally introducing the additional therapeutic agent to the vessel such as by injection in the case of a blood vessel or by bathing the esophagus for example.
In some cases where a slow release of the therapeutic agent is desired, as by the release of a therapeutic agent entrained in a gelatin or other hydrophilic or hydrophobic polymers on a stent. Once the therapeutic agent was delivered, replenishment required one of two procedures. In one, a new stent was inserted to be adjacent the old stent. Sometimes this reduced the effectiveness of the therapeutic agent, particularly when the area of treatment was displaced from the second stent. An alternative that overcame that problem was substituting a new stent for the old stent. It is true that percutaneous transluminal procedures and other procedures involving the insertion of stent into the body have improved in recent years. Likewise the reduction in the size of the instruments inserted into the patient reduces the risk of damage. However, it is still a fact that each insertion and extraction risks further damage to afflicted areas and damage to otherwise unaffected areas through which the instruments pass and can add to patient trauma. Moreover, insertion and withdrawal of additional instruments in sequence increases the time of the physician, staff, and medical facility, and the cost of multiple instruments. Thus, reducing the number of instruments and the overall size of the instruments necessarily inserted and withdrawn from a patient, the steps required by the processes, and the overall size of each of the instruments is generally preferred.
Thus, the above-described references generally disclose various forms stents and delivery systems for treatments or therapies using a catheter in percutaneous transluminal procedures and other internal procedures. Some combined with stent delivery systems, which may include a balloon for deploying the stent, while others combine balloon therapy and therapeutic agent delivery systems. Still others of the references disclose a stent delivery system combined with a therapeutic delivery system or a stent that actually enables the slow release of a therapeutic agent carried by the stent. However, none of these references disclose a stent that enable both the release of a therapeutic agent therefrom and the charging or recharging of the stent with a therapeutic agent once positioned within the body to permit delivery of therapeutic agent to replenish a stent. None provides a structure for improving the efficiency of percutaneous transluminal procedures and other internal procedures by providing a stent for dispensing a therapeutic agent that can receive additional therapeutic agents in vivo and a therapeutic agent delivery system for replenishing the therapeutic agent dispensed from the stent. None disclose a delivery system and method capable of replenishing a therapeutic agent after it has been depleted from an original supply.